Be Forceful. Be Creative

In my interview with Nicole Dobbs, she explained a lot of her approach to life, education and science through seemingly unrelated topics. Whether that be zombies or The Lord of the Rings, her ability to relate the things she enjoys to the things she does represents one of the basic building blocks of creativity — forced connections. By forcing relationships between two things that are unrelated we make our brains reevaluate our percepetion of both.

For the second creative exercise we’ll explore the idea of forced connections, and how that can help power your brainstorms. To make this exercise a little easier I’ve included a list of the supernatural and professions to pair up, though you can come up with your own list.

Supernatural

Zombie

Vampire

Werewolf

Witch

Alien

Ghost

Professions

Politician

Hairdresser

Banker

Scientist

Musician

Teacher

Step 1: Pick a topic from the supernatural and profession columns.

Step 2: Draw two overlapping circles to create a Venn diagram

Step 3: Write the supernatural in one circle, the profession in the other.

Step 4: In the overlapping area write phrases and words that they have in common.

Step 5: Create a slogan to be used in an advertisement for the supernatural profession based off the common words or phrases.

The funnier connections seem to work the best, so make sure to laugh and have fun while completing this exercise. I chose to combine a zombie with a politician in honor of Nicole’s strange fascination with zombies.

Be sure to read part 1 and part 2 of my interview with Nicole Dobbs, and check back soon for my next interview with Elizabeth Lalli-Reese the head of Human Resources at Ace Cash Express for Untapped Creativity.